for whatever we lose
by sugar free vanilla
Summary: 'He doesn't know how long they stand there; only that, at some point, their hands find each other - and eventually, as the sun rises over the green-blue ocean, he feels whatever part of him was lost with the squeeze of the trigger begin to grow back.' Future-set oneshot.


**This is a fill from a prompt on my tumblr (castleholic), which I'll post at the bottom. This is more - poetic? imagery heavy? - than I normally write but it was fun to play with and I _think _it turned out alright.**

**Drew inspiration from ee cumming's 'maggie and milly and molly and may', especially the last two lines.**

**Hope you like it!**

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><p><em>For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)<em>

_ it's always ourselves we find in the sea_

**from 'maggie and millie and molly and may', ee cummings**

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><p>Blue eyes cast an unseeing gaze over the bright lights of Manhattan at night, the glow nothing but a dazzling blur through the wet fringe of his lashes. The tears collected on them refract the shine, splintered rainbows doing nothing to abate the the inchmeal advancement of dark poison curling across his view of the world, tendrils unfurling like the grey leaves of a sickly fern.<p>

Wind screeches through unkempt hair and tousles the dishevelled locks further, all the while tearing at his skin with cold, unforgiving teeth. The bitter freeze-burn of the gusts doesn't hold a candle to the ice running through his veins, though, doesn't compare to the haunting frost crawling its way deeper into his chest.

He killed a man, a week ago now - lifted the gun. Pulled the trigger, once. Twice. Watched, detached, as the body had hit the cold, hard warehouse floor with an echoing _thud_. No remorse.

What does that _make _him?

The exhaust pipe of one of the vehicles trawling the streets below backfires, the bang tossing him back into the memory, forces him to live through it again. He can feel the cold, metallic weight of Beckett's extra-piece in his hands, can taste fear on his tongue, sharp and coppery like blood. He closes his eyes against the onslaught of vivid images but it only makes it worse, his eyelids cinema screens in high definition.

Footsteps pace the way from the door, falter a few feet from him before they close the gap and yet still he does not turn around. He can feel her breath hot against his neck, such is her proximity. Can feel hesitant questions hanging, stagnant and silent, in every warm exhale.

"I had a dream," she offers, finally, voice no more than a hushed murmur, a raw whisper. "You - died, Castle. And then I woke up."

_And you weren't there._

He hears the words as clearly as if she'd vocalised them.

A tight wave of guilt loosens, the knot of it in the pit of his stomach unraveling into a far reaching spool that dissolves, settles against every tiny capillary, diffuses into his blood to be pumped relentlessly to every part of his body by the tired pound of his heart.

"I'm sorry," is all he says. The words sound foreign to him, as though they weren't spilled from his mouth, harsh and loud in comparison to the softness of her voice. His vocal chords fail him, then - he tries to continue speaking but can't, his attempt at words escaping into the world as a choked sigh.

A mournful moan pours from her, forehead dropping to rest on his shoulder from behind and she steps into him, presses her body to his back and slides her arms around his waist. "This is my fault. Don't apologise. _Please._" She's begging, muffled against the the velour of his robe but he catches every sound. "Don't be sorry for saving my life."

"I'm not - I could _never -" _He twists, spins to face her so he can look her in the eye, lifts her chin as he cradles her cheek in his palm. "You don't think that, do you?"

"No - of course not. I'm sorry." Her eyes swear her sincerity, promise him that she doesn't really believe he'd regret that. "But - the cost. Is it too much?"

The heaviness of his gaze is all the answer she needs, the shadows crawling from his pupils to darken his irises telling a thousand words. There is nothing he wouldn't give for her, no price he wouldn't pay. More than she'd ever ask of him. More than she'd ever want him to give.

"I never wanted this for you," she keens as his words shatter something in her, her fingers scrabbling at his back, nails cutting into his skin as she pushes herself as close to him as she can. As if she can draw strength from his frame. As if he has any left. "I never wanted you to know. What is is to end a life."

"I know, Kate, I know," he reassures her, coming back to himself if only for the purpose of comforting his wife. It's natural, a reflex, the need to comfort her so visceral that it coaxes him from the rotting cesspit of self-loathing that he's been so close to sinking into.

"Let me show you something." The insistent tugging at his sleeve informs him this isn't a request.

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><p>He's surprised when she bypasses the loft, pads past the solid oak entrance to their home in her rubber-soled tennis shoes and pajamas, calls the elevator, pushing the button that will take them to the building's underground garage. As the steel doors slide shut her hand slips down his sleeve and into his, their fingers intertwining, like the roots of two trees that grew so closely that they became hopelessly tangled. Or perhaps hope<em>fully<em> so, he thinks. He could do with a bit of optimism right now.

She drives, of course. He has no clue of the destination and his concentration is fractured at best, wouldn't be safe for him to sit behind the wheel.

He doesn't realise how long their journey has been until they stop and the unmistakable brine of sea air floods his nostrils as her door opens.

He follows suit, trails after the hand that reaches back for him, pale skin shining silver in the moonlight, comes to an abrupt halt beside her when she stops suddenly. The waves crest and break against the white of the sand endlessly, a continuous cycle of destruction and rebirth.

And then she speaks.

"When I was a rookie, I got into a bad situation. Kill or be killed - and I killed, obviously," he's never heard this story before, curiosity emerging tentatively from the weighted haze of darkness that suffocates his mind. "Royce - you remember Royce - took me here after. He said - he said, 'Kid. You gotta make peace with it, or it's gonna tear you up. Let the ocean do some of that work for ya'. And you know I don't believe in magic, but I'd completely lost myself in the guilt, was letting it eat me alive… Castle, I was _drinking. _Even as I saw what that coping mechanism was doing to my dad. I was… awful - and somehow, miraculously, this place brought me back from that. And I just… hope it'll do the same for you." His heart bleeds for her, drowns all his words so that all he can offer her is the litany of emotions that blur his vision, the gentle stroke of his thumb at her cheekbone. She's standing tall and straight and strong, and he knows how to read her now, knows any more physical contact than that will cause her to crumble.

He walks closer to the water's edge, sand slipping into the slippers he'd dragged on on his way up to the roof and scratching at his bare feet. Kate is no more than an inch away, the heat of their bodies combining and driving away the night chill.

He doesn't know how long they stand there; only that, at some point, their hands find each other - and eventually, as the sun rises over the green-blue ocean, he feels whatever part of him was lost with the squeeze of the trigger begin to grow back.

"_For whatever we lose - a you or a me,"_ Castle muses, recites the line as though he has an audience in the restless water. "_It's always ourselves we find in the sea."_

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><p><strong>Prompt: 'castle kills someone to save kate's life and gets really depressed about it'<strong>

**tumblr: castleholic**

**twitter: _sfv**

**x**


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